A Corpus-Based Study of Nominalization as a Feature of Translator’s Style (Based on the English Versions of Hong Lou Meng)

Hou, Yu

doi:https://doi.org/10.7202/1025051ar

1. Introduction

The present study aims to investigate the use of nominalization as a feature of translator’s style in two English versions of Hong Lou Meng[1] (HLM). Specifically, this study intends to examine how similarly or differently the translators use nominalization, what its stylistic effects are, and what potential factors trigger its use. The examination is coupled with an illustration of how nominalization manifests implicitation in translation. Following Baker (2000: 245), this study approaches translator style as “a matter of patterning: it involves describing preferred or recurring patterns of linguistic behaviour, rather than individual or one-off instances of intervention.”

The second section of the paper justifies the choice of implicitation in translation as a direct point of departure in this study by presenting the state of affairs of explicitation and implicitation in translation research. The third section outlines the theoretical development of nominalization in English linguistics with a view to introducing the definition of English nominalization in the present study. The fourth section concerns studies on style in HLM English translation. The fifth section details the methodology applied in this study. The sixth section, which constitutes the main body of the discussion, gives a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the translators’ uses of nominalization as adverbial.

2. Explicitation and implicitation in translation

Explicitation was defined by Vinay and Darbelnet in 1958 as “a stylistic technique which consists of making explicit in the target language what remains implicit in the source language because it is apparent from either the context or the situation” (Vinay and Darbelnet 1958/1995: 342). It is claimed as “one of the most thoroughly studied phenomena in translation studies” (Gumul 2006: 171), both theoretically (Blum-Kulka’s explicitation hypothesis [1986]; Klaudy’s asymmetry hypothesis [Klaudy and Karoly 2005]) and empirically (Olohan and Baker 2000; Puurtinen 2003; 2004; Klaudy and Karoly 2005; Konsalova 2007; Shih 2008; Hjort-Pedersen and Faber 2010). Blum-Kulka (1986: 292) claims that explicitation is “inherent in the process of translation” regardless of the differences between the two linguistic and textual systems involved, while Klaudy and Karoly (2005: 14) postulate that “explicitations in the L1→L2 direction are not always counterbalanced by implicitations in the L2→L1 direction.”

It should be noted that some of the above empirical studies are conducted with an aim of verifying whether or not explicitation is a universal strategy of translation, regardless of language pair and direction of translation. More remarkably, the research on explicitation in translation far exceeds that on implicitation in translation. This significant imbalance has already drawn the attention of Klaudy and Karoly (2005: 13). They rightly assert that implicitation “is treated as a stepbrother of explicitation: it is generally mentioned merely incidentally.” In view of the current situation of research on explicitation and implicitation in translation, this empirical study intends to focus on implicitation in translation. Specifically, this study chooses to investigate nominalization in translation as one of the manifestations of implicitation (see Section 3 for a definition).

3. Nominalization in English

Nominalization in English is considered one of the most widely studied linguistic phenomena. Its theoretical development, to a large extent, informs the whole process of the development of English linguistics. Major linguistic schools have addressed, in different degrees, the issue of English nominalization in their representative works.

In structural linguistics, the issue of English nominalization is brought to light primarily by the contributions of the Prague School, and mainly by its founding figure, Vilém Mathesius. In comparing modern English and modern Czech, Mathesius (1961/1975) first uses “complex condensation of the sentence” to designate the introduction, into a sentence, of a nominal element or phrase replacing the finite verb of a subordinate clause and thus avoiding using a clausal structure. He points out that the most frequently used sentence condensers in English are present participle, infinitive, and gerund. For more recent applications of his complex condensation theory, see e.g., Duris (2006) and Janigova (2007).

In transformational-generative linguistics, whether English nominalization is a part of syntax (represented by Lees’ transformational approach [1963]) or of the lexicon (represented by Chomsky’s lexicalist approach [1971]) was a contentious issue; however, it is now mostly treated as part of the lexicon. Lees (1963), applying the transformational theory put forward by Chomsky (1957) to the analysis of phrases and sentences, assumes that English nominalization is a transformation process. On the other hand, Chomsky’s position (1971) is that while gerundive nominals (traditionally treated as the result of inflectional morphology) are transformationally derived from verbs, derived nominals (traditionally regarded as the result of derivational morphology) are not transformed from verbs, but should directly enter into the lexicon.

From the perspective of cognitive linguistics, Langacker investigates three main aspects of English nominalization: “kinds,” “periphrasis,” and “predictability” (Langacker 1991: 22-50). In addition, he notices the semantic and cognitive differences between a deverbal noun (for example, explosion) and its verbal form (for example, explode), although both may describe the same event – There was an explosion! Someone exploded. According to Langacker (1987: 90), “explode and explosion contrast semantically because they employ different images to construct the same conceptual content: explode imposes a processual construal of the profiled event, explosion portrays it as an abstract region. Nominalizing a verb necessarily endows it with the conceptual properties characteristic of nouns.”

In comparison with the aforementioned linguistic schools, the systemic-functional linguistic school represented by Halliday has carried out a more systematic and in-depth study of English nominalization in relation to context. Halliday (1994: 352) defines English nominalization as “the single most powerful resource for creating grammatical metaphor,” and argues that nominalization has various functions. In terms of register function, “it is a characteristic of nominalizations that they appear more often as a standard feature of some special functional styles/registers of language use, particularly of those like political, legal, administrative, journalistic, and scientific” (Radovanovic 2001: 43-44). This stylistic norm may explain to a certain degree why English nominalization is considerably less studied in literature, and particularly in translated literature.

This study chooses to follow the definition of English nominalization by Lees (1963) as a nominalized transformation of a finite verbal form. It only focuses on three categories of the nominal (NOM) as a representative of the process of nominalization, i.e., gerundive NOM (GN), derived NOM (DN), and zero-derived NOM (ZN) (rather than on infinitival nominal or factive nominal). Nominalized structures containing each one of the three categories of the NOM are explained in this study by a process of syntactic derivation from their more explicit sentential predications. It follows that nominalized structures in translation are a manifestation of implicitation in the sense that they are implicit in relation to their corresponding sentential predications in terms of subject, object, verbal categories (tense, aspect, voice, or modality), as well as the logical relations that their corresponding sentential predications may represent. In this sense, in addition to formal style, a patterned use of nominalization could also be a feature of the translator’s concise style.

4. Studies on style in Hung Lou Meng English translation

Considerable research has already been undertaken to examine the English versions of HLM. Some seven monographs have been published in Chinese (Lin 1976; Wang 2001; Liu 2004; Fan 2004; Feng 2006; 2008; Liu 2010) and numerous articles, both in Chinese and English. The great majority of these studies focus on the two best-known versions of the novel: Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang’s A Dream of Red Mansions (1978-1980)[2], and David Hawkes and John Minford’s The Story of the Stone (1973-1986)[3]. Three recent exceptions to this, however, are Liu (2010), Hou and Liu (2012), who also consider Bencraft Joly’s version (1892-1893)[4],[5], and Ji and Oakes (2012), who examine several early translations, including Joly’s. The versions by Hawkes and Yang and Yang have received more attention mainly because they are complete 120-chapter versions while Joly’s only includes the first 56 chapters. The relative paucity of research conducted on Joly’s version prompts the present study to focus on comparing his version with that of Yang and Yang. In addition, Joly, as a Victorian translator, is expected to be more contrastive in style with Yang and Yang.

Methodologically, much of the existing research has focused on more traditional criticism of language and cultural issues. Almost all the HLM English translation studies available have been conducted with the Chinese source-text as a starting point to examine the translators’ strategies, that is to say, to examine particular patterns of linguistic usage in the Chinese source text. More recently, the rise of corpus-driven methodologies in translation studies has prompted HLM researchers to adopt more statistically informed approaches, and to take the target texts as a starting point to examine the translators’ use of linguistic patterns. Liu (2010), whose key work details the construction of a HLM corpus, considers various aspects, including the use of reporting verbs as a feature of translator’s style. More recent studies, such as those by Li, Zhang and Liu (2011) and Ji and Oakes (2012), have sought to take such an approach further. However, these studies are still few in number, and the focus of the present study, nominalization, has not previously been examined.

5. Methodology

Based on Mathesius’ complex condensation theory (1961/1975), which was subsequently elaborated by scholars such as Radovanovic (1978) and Casule (1989), this study describes the NOM from the perspective of the sentence:

as adverbial, condensing adverbial finite clauses of temporal (see Example [1]), causal, purposive, conditional, and concessive meanings;
in the position of subject, condensing nominal that-clauses (see Example [2]) and adverbial finite clauses of temporal, causal (see Example [3]), purposive, conditional, and concessive meanings;
and in the position of object complementing verbs, adjectives, and nouns, condensing nominal that-clauses (see Example [4]), if-clauses (see Example [5]), and relative finite clauses (see Example [6]).

In all the examples, the emphasis is mine:

All occurrences of NOMs in the two English versions of HLM are manually tagged after the consultation of the two authoritative English grammar books: A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Quirk et al. 1985) and Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English (Biber et al. 1999). Their consultation is especially necessary for determining the verbs, adjectives and nouns that can be complemented by finite clausal structures. A NOM tag is joined with a lexical unit by the underscore (see examples [1] to [6] above). In (Example 1), ADV_TEM_ZN denotes that “chat” is a ZN and “in the course of a chat” condenses an adverbial clause of temporal meaning. In (Example 2), SUB_THAT_DN denotes that “recovery” is a DN and “your complete recovery” is in the position of subject condensing a nominal that-clause. In Example 5), OBJ_VERB_DN denotes that “drinking” is a GN and “your drinking” is in the position of object complementing the verb “mind.” In the case of the NOMs appearing as adverbial, prepositions or prepositional phrases introducing them, rather than themselves, are tagged for the convenience of counting the occurrences of the prepositions or propositional phrases (see Example [1]). After the tagging of all the NOMs is fininshed, the AntConc software is used for statistical purposes.

In this study, both quantitative and qualitative analyses are conducted. The quantitative analysis deals with how similarly or differently the translators use the three syntactic categories (and their respective sub-categories) of the three types of the NOMs. The qualitative analysis is concerned with what structures the nominalized structures correspond to in the original text, what their stylistic effects are, and what potential factors trigger their use. In addition, the quantitative analysis will also demonstrate how nominalized structures represent implicitation.

This study of nominalization is based on the first 56 chapters of the two English versions of HLM. Table 1 below shows quantitative data on the use of the NOMs in both versions. In terms of syntactic category, the NOMs are predominantly used as adverbial in both versions. Therefore, this study will give a closer analysis of the NOMs as adverbial as a feature of both translators’ styles.

The NOMs used in the first 56 chapters of the two English versions of HLM — Table 1

The NOMs used in the first 56 chapters of the two English versions of *HLM*

6. Analysis of the use of the NOMs as adverbial in the two versions of HLM

6.1. Quantitative analysis

Table 2 below shows how the NOMs are used by the translators as a condenser of temporal clauses.

The NOMs as a condenser of temporal clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 2

The NOMs as a condenser of temporal clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

Joly uses almost twice as many NOMs as Yang and Yang (848 NOMs vs. 441 NOMs). In terms of the three categories of the NOM, Joly makes more use of each type than Yang and Yang (424 GNs vs. 240 GNs, 277 DNs vs. 127 DNs, and 147 ZNs vs. 74 ZNs). As far as the variety of the constructions is concerned, Joly uses 13 types of constructions, 3 types more than those used by Yang and Yang (i.e., “in the middle of + NOM,” “previous to + NOM,” and “subsequent to + NOM”). In addition, Joly uses 3 types of formal prepositions or prepositional phrases in collocation with the NOMs while Yang and Yang choose only 1 type, as shown by the boldface items in Table 2.

Table 3 shows how the NOMs are used by the translators as a condenser of causal clauses. Yang and Yang use 50 NOMs more than Joly (145 NOMs vs. 95 NOMs). In terms of the three categories of the NOM, Joly uses 38 GNs and 20 ZNs more than Yang and Yang, while Yang and Yang use 8 DNs more than Joly. In terms of the variety of the constructions, Joly makes total use of 18 types, 6 types more than what Yang and Yang use. In addition, Joly chooses 6 types of formal prepositional phrases in collocation with the NOMs, as shown by the boldface letters; however, Yang and Yang do not use any formal preposition or prepositional phrase.

The NOMs as a condenser of causal clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 3

The NOMs as a condenser of causal clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

In terms of the individual types of constructions, “for + NOM” is most frequently registered in both versions. Within this type of construction, “for + fear (of something or that)” is the most frequently used collocation as it occurs 39 times in Yang and Yang’s version and 11 times in Joly’s version. This construction is also found in collocation with verbs such as “apologize for + GN,” “attack someone for + GN,” “blame someone for + GN,” “bully someone for + GN,” “call someone to task for + GN,” “cane someone for + GN,” “criticize someone for + GN,” “envy someone for + GN,” “fine someone for + GN,” “forgive for + GN,” “laugh at someone for + GN,” “praise someone for + GN,” “punish someone for + GN,” “rebuke someone for + GN,” “reproach someone for + GN,” “scold someone for + GN,” “tease someone for + GN,” and so on. This also explains why GNs here are predominantly used in both versions.

Table 4 shows how the NOMs are used by the translators as a condenser of purposive clauses. In total, Joly makes use of over seven times as many NOMs as Yang and Yang (177 NOMs vs. 25 NOMs). Joly also makes much greater use of each one of the three categories of the NOM than Yang and Yang (59 GNs vs. 2 GNs, 43 DNs vs. 13 DNs, and 75 ZNs vs. 10 ZNs). Joly chooses 13 types of prepositions or prepositional phrases in collocation with the NOMs, including 10 types of boldfaced formal prepositional phrases, while Yang and Yang only choose 2 types of informal prepositions introducing the NOMs.

The NOMs as a condenser of purposive clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 4

The NOMs as a condenser of purposive clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

In Yang and Yang’s version, 9 ZNs of “search” appear in the collocation “verb + in search.” In Joly’s version, 16 out of the 59 GNs collocate with the prepositional phrase “with the purpose of,” 9 GNs collocate with the prepositional phrase “with the intent of,” and 7 GNs collocate with the prepositional phrase “with the object of”; 24 out of the 43 DNs collocate with the preposition “for” (with none of them appearing more than 4 times) and 10 DNs of “pursuit” appear in the collocation “verb + in pursuit”; 53 ZNs of “search” appear in the collocation “verb + in search” and 10 ZNs of “quest” appear in the collocation “verb + in quest.”

The NOMs as a condenser of conditional clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 5

The NOMs as a condenser of conditional clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

Table 5 shows how the NOMs are used by the translators as a condenser of conditional clauses. Joly chooses 4 types of prepositions or prepositional phrases in collocation with 71 NOMs (including 1 type of formal prepositional phrase “in the event of”) while Yang and Yang choose 2 types of prepositions in collocation with 23 NOMs. GNs are the most frequently used type in both versions.

The NOMs as a condenser of concessive clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 6

The NOMs as a condenser of concessive clauses in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

Table 6 shows how the NOMs are used by the translators as a condenser of concessive clauses. Joly uses 2 types of prepositions or prepositional phrases (including 1 type of formal preposition “despite”) in collocation with 11 NOMs, while Yang and Yang use 1 type of prepositions introducing 2 NOMs.

The NOMs as adverbial in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of HLM — Table 7

The NOMs as adverbial in the first 56 chapters of the two versions of *HLM*

Table 7 illustrates that Joly uses the NOMs more frequently than Yang and Yang. Specifically, Joly makes more use of the NOMs than Yang and Yang in both number (1,202 NOMs vs. 636 NOMs) and percentage (65% vs. 35%). In terms of the three categories of the NOM, Joly makes much greater use of each of them than Yang and Yang in number (609 GNs vs. 353 GNs, 343 DNs vs. 154 DNs, 250 ZNs vs. 129 ZNs), while Yang and Yang make greater use of the GNs than Joly in percentage (56% vs. 50%). With regard to the types of prepositions or prepositional phrases introducing the NOMs, Joly uses nearly twice as many types as Yang and Yang (50 types vs. 27 types). In terms of the NOMs as adverbial, Yang and Yang make much greater use of the NOMs condensing causal clauses in both number and percentage, while Joly makes more use of the NOMs condensing the other four types of clauses in both number and percentage.

In addition, Joly uses the NOMs in a much more formal way than Yang and Yang. He makes greater use of formal prepositions or prepositional phrases in collocation with the NOMs in number (99 occurrences vs. 5 occurrences) and percentage (8% vs. 0.08%). Joly’s use of formal prepositions or prepositional phrases covers 21 types, while Yang and Yang’s use involves only 1 type of “in the course of.” Of the 21 types, almost half come from introducing the NOMs as a condenser of purposive clauses.

Furthermore, Joly uses the NOMs in a relatively more patterned and focused way than Yang and Yang, which can be seen in their most frequently-used types of constructions and collocations. As far as the most frequently-used types of constructions are concerned, there are 7 types in Joly’s version, accounting for 83% of the total number of the NOMs used as adverbial in his version (i.e., “after + NOM” [322 entries], “upon + NOM” [208 entries], “on + NOM” [160 entries], “at + NOM” [99 entries], “in + NOM” [87 entries], “for + NOM” [70 entries], and “by + NOM” [64 entries]), while there are 5 types in Yang and Yang’s version, accounting for 79% of the total number of the NOMs used as adverbial in their version (i.e., “after + NOM” [241 entries], “for + NOM” [103 entries], “before + NOM” [66 entries], “at + NOM” [57 entries], and “on + NOM” [34 entries]). With regard to the most frequently-used types of collocations, there are 5 types in his version (i.e., “upon + hearing” [88 entries], “on + return” [58 entries], “at + [the] sight” [54 entries], “in + search” [46 entries], and “after + listening” [34 entries]) while there are only 2 types in Yang and Yang’s version (i.e., “at + [the] sight” [37 entries] and “for + fear” [39 entries]).

In addition to the various differences outlined above, there are two important similarities in the NOMs used in the two versions. First, both Yang and Yang and Joly predominantly use the NOMs as a condenser of temporal clauses in both number and percentage. Second, both of them predominantly use GNs in both number and percentage, followed by DNs and ZNs. These similarities may reflect a general tendency to use the NOMs in literary translation from Chinese into English.

6.2. Qualitative analysis

The quantitative analysis above has shown that Joly uses the NOMs in a much more formal way than Yang and Yang in the sense that he makes greater use of formal prepositions or prepositional phrases in collocation with the NOMs. The following qualitative analysis will demonstrate, from another perspective, that Joly uses the NOMs in a more formal way than Yang and Yang. It will examine Joly’s use of formal NOMs (in collocation with formal prepositional phrases (see Examples [7], [8], [9] and [10]), and his use of formal expressions in correspondence to Yang and Yang’s use of nominalized structures (see Examples [11], [12], and [13]).

7

8

In example (7), 读书 (study) constitutes a serial verb construction with 进去 (move in). In correspondence to 读书, Joly chooses a nominalized structure as a condenser of a purposive clause, which makes implicit the subject and the modal verb could. In comparison with Yang and Yang’s choice of continue his studies, Joly’s choice of prosecution of the studies seems to be formal in stylistic effect. This formal impression mainly comes from the derived ending -tion of prosecution, which constitutes the ending of many scientific and technical terms.

In example (8), the underlined part in the original is a verbal clausal structure. In translating, Joly chooses a nominalized structure as a condenser of a temporal clause, which makes implicit the past perfect aspect. In correspondence to 去 (go), his choice of the DN departure appears to be more formal than Yang and Yang’s choice of gone. It seems that Joly’s nominalized structure is made so as to avoid the appearance of a complex subject in its corresponding finite clausal structure.

In example (9), the three verbs (梳 [comb], 洗 [wash], and 来 [come]) form a serial verb construction. Both 梳 and 洗 are plain words and often found in daily life. In translating, Joly reproduces a complex sentence where he nominalizes the first two verbs, while Yang and Yang reproduce a compound sentence. Yang and Yang render 梳 and 洗 in a simplified way into toilet, while Joly renders them into two separate expressions performing her toilette and (performing her)ablutions. There is much difference between 洗 and ablution in semantic meaning. Joly’s choice of the term ablutions in religious rites makes the dressing up of the character in the original rather formal.

In example (10), 更 (change) and 进 (enter) constitute a serial verbal construction. Joly renders 更衣 (change one’s dress) into a nominalized structure introduced by a formal prepositional phrase – with the purpose of – while the Yang and Yang render it into a concise infinitival structure. The nominalized structure makes implicit the modal verb could. In translating 更 (change), Yang and Yang choose change, while Joly chooses a periphrastic predicate structure effecting a change. This structure is quite formal in stylistic effect since it, together with many other similar structures used by Joly such as institute inquiries, exercise control and prosecute search, is often found in “officialese” (Olsson 1961: 221).

11

In Example (11), Yang and Yang choose a nominalized structure as a condenser of a conditional clause, which makes implicit the subject and the simple present tense. As the correspondence of the colloquial verbal expression 别你一别 (say goodbye to you), Joly’s periphrastic predicate expression take my leave (of you) seems to be more formal than Yang and Yang’s expression of say goodbye. As a result, the intimate niece-and-aunt relationship between Keqing and Xifeng in the original is made formal and unfamiliar.

In Example (12), the original underlined part is a verbal clausal structure. Yang and Yang choose a nominalized structure, which makes implicit the past tense. In correspondence to 死 (die), Joly’s choice of demise seems to give a more formal impression than Yang and Yang’s death. This choice may arise from Joly’s intention to accord it with the noble status of the Duke of Rongguo.

In Example (13), the context previous to the original is that Jiao Da, an old man-servant in Madame You’s house, was cursing loudly since he had been given the job of accompanying Qinzhong home at night. Yang and Yang choose a nominalized structure, which gives a concise effect since it makes implicit the subject and the present perfect aspect. With regard to 老 (grow old), Yang and Yang translate it as it is while Joly chooses advanced in years, which is often used as a formal and polite expression of saying someone is old. Here, Joly’s choice may not agree completely with the original where Madame You was complaining to Xifeng about Jia Da’s taking advantage of his old age and lack of decent manners rather than showing respect to him.

6.3. Possible interpretations

The use of nominalization in HLM translation is potentially influenced by a number of factors (both at and beyond the linguistic level), which may come from the Chinese source language, from the English target language, and from the social-cultural milieu in which the translators lived. In terms of the Chinese language, although subject-predicate-object is a common sentence structure, there is another equally common structure in which subject is elliptic. It is not grammatically required in Chinese to have a subject in every clause or sentence. The ellipsis of subjects, enormously prevalent in the HLM source text sentences, may trigger the use of nominalized structures (see Example [11]). In addition, serial verb constructions in the HLM source text may also trigger the use of nominalized structures (see Example [9]). In terms of the English target language, its stylistic conventions may trigger the use of nominalization (see Example [8]).

Joly’s typical use of nominalization in HLM translation represents a feature of his formal style, which may have been mainly influenced by the literary tradition and the style and ideology of novel writing in the British Victorian era. According to Wong (1992: 492-493), as Joly’s version “was completed a century ago, its largely Victorian style has become too formal – indeed too old-fashioned – for the modern English reader.” In the opinion of Wang (2006: 140), the most typical feature of Joly’s version is that “it is full of formal and solemn wordings as well as complicated and lengthy sentences so that its language is more like what Dickens used in his novels.” However, in order to establish the influence of the Victorian era on these patterns, it is necessary to investigate how nominalization is used in English literary works published in that period, which is beyond the scope of this study.

Yang and Yang’s typical use of nominalization in HLM translation represents a feature of their concise style, which may be explained by at least two possible reasons: firstly, Yang’s personal stylistic preference, and secondly, the process by which he collaborated with his wife. With regard to stylistic preference, some evidence of a penchant for concision can be found in Yang’s autobiography (Yang 2002)[5], where he spoke of his admiration for the concise language in Zhou Zuoren and Lu Xun’s work, and his love of English poetry. With an enormous and wide reading of English poems, he was particularly interested in poems written by poets such as Henry Longfellow (1807-1882), George Byron (1788-1824), and Percy Shelley (1792-1822) (Yu 2009: 38). I do not, however, suggest that these two aspects constitute specific influences on his translation style. With regard to the husband-and-wife collaboration, Mr. Yang often used the method of oral rendition when translating HLM at high speed while his wife, sitting at the typewriter, recorded and later on polished his first draft. According to Li, Zhang and Liu (2011: 163), “such a mode of oral translation must have also affected the length of the sentences in his translation, as short sentences are usually an important feature of oral texts as compared with written texts.”

7. Conclusion

This paper conducts a linguistic, descriptive and explanatory study of nominalization as a feature of translator’s style based on the two English versions of HLM. This study is a significant step forward in HLM English translation studies because it, like similar studies conducted by Liu (2010) and Li, Zhang and Liu (2011), also moves from impressionistic assessments of translator’s style towards quantifiable data. Joly’s style in HLM translation is described as much more formal than that of Yang and Yang by scholars such as Wong (1992) and Wang (2006). However, their claims were not based on quantitative analyses. The present corpus-based study of nominalization has succeeded in probing into both translators’ styles in HLM translation. Joly’s patterned use of nominalization reflects his formal style while Yang and Yang’s patterned use of nominalization reflects their concise style.

It is also worth noting that the way a literary translation deals with nominalization as an exponent of implicitation (from Chinese) into English may have a strong effect on the entire literary structure and the formality of the translated work. The same amount of nominalization in a target text will create the same literary effect no matter whether it is translated from Chinese or any other language. This study has identified two different ways of using nominalization in translation, which may create two different literary effects. If translators intend to create a formal effect on their works, they may follow Joly’s way in using nominalization, together with other techniques such as formal periphrastic predicate constructions and formal lexical expressions. If they intend to create a highly concise effect on their works, they may follow Yang and Yang’s way in using nominalization, together with other concise expressions.